The Times, How rail projects such as Crossrail are changing London's property map.

March 28th, 2008

"Several other rail projects will be finished well before Crossrail and are already having an impact. By June 2010, the East London Line will run from Dalston Junction, in the North, to New Cross, Crystal Palace and West Croydon in the South. It will stop off at the southeast London suburbs of Brockley, Honor Oak Park, Forest Hill, Sydenham and Penge West, turning the current trickle of property buyers from the City and Canary Wharf into a steadier stream.

"By 2011, the long-awaited extension between Dalston Junction and Highbury & Islington will be complete. Prices in Dalston, a more inaccessible and less gentrified part of Hackney, have already risen in anticipation of the link. For example, a one-bedroom flat at The Interchange scheme would have cost £210,000 off-plan in 2006, but these small flats are now being sold for £250,000. "

Yes - but I'm glad I'm weathering the storm here than somewhere that isn't getting a rail link, doesn't have some nice parks, isn't attracting new independent business; and doesn't have a lot of people who are concerned about the communcity and keeping its assets protected.

@Pete - it's all relative. Even if the London market deflates, the ELL will make Brockley more attractive to a wider range of people, meaning that demand is likely to increase relative to many other areas of London.

Yes I noticed that Brockley was labelled a "suburb"! Yet North London areas like Hackney don't attract the same. Always strange considering that Brockley is in zone 2 and only just outside the "020 7" phone area! I guess that's what's made Brockley what it is though. Strange though

I always like the way that the S E london "suburbs" are interchangabel - telegraph hill commutes through lewisham to peckham via nunhead in the ES property sections, and anything interesting in Brockley gets moved to somewhere they think readers might of heard of - surely there are some south london property journalists, or at least with access to a working a-z?

Ooo, I don't agree with that. Suburbs are mediocre dormitories full of social climbers. Surely none of that sort of thing goes on around here. Too many earthy sons of toil always ready to slap down the slightest sign of pretention.

Sounds like the dividing line for 020 7 or 020 8 is the railway track... Another division between the dark, ahem, west side and the conservation area.

I suppose Brockley get labelled a suburb because London has always had a north of the river bias. Central London is considered mainly to be from the west end to the City, all north of the river, hence anything south, whether or not it's zone 2 or 020 7, in many people's minds, it's just not real London. And not being onthe Tube map didn't help much